1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an inner handle assembly mounted to a sliding door, and more particularly, to an inner handle assembly of a sliding door having a door-open maintaining means for maintaining an opened state of the sliding door, which can allow an inner handle to be operated conveniently to open and shut the sliding door.
2. Description of the Related Art
A sliding door mounted on a van type car is in a sliding type that it slides in the back and forth direction of a car body along the side surface of the car body to be opened or shut. Therefore, passengers can get in or off the car easily and the opening and shutting of the door is not interfered from the surroundings even in a small area.
Identically with a general hinged door, the conventional sliding door includes a door-close maintaining means for maintaining a closed state of the door, a locking controller connected to the door-close maintaining means to control the operation of the door-close maintaining means, inner handle assembly and outer handle assembly connected to the locking controller to release the door from the closed state, and a door locking knob connected to the locking controller for controlling the locking controller to lock the door in the closed state. If the door opened is closed, the door is automatically fastened by the door-close maintaining means not to be opened. When inner and outer handles are operated in the state that the door is closed, the door-close maintaining means is released to open the closed door. When the door locking knob is operated, the door is not opened even though the inner and outer handles are operated in the state that the door is closed.
However, in the conventional sliding door, if the door is opened in the state that the car is parked on a slanted road surface, the door is automatically closed by self-weight, thereby the passenger may be injured by the automatically closed door. To prevent the problem, the passengers must hold the opened door.
To solve the problem, a method for installing a door-open maintaining means inside the sliding door to maintain the open state of the door has been disclosed and widely used. Moreover, the locking controller, the inner handle and the outer handle have been under study in many directions to control the operation of the door-open maintaining means.
For an example, a sliding door control assembly is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,605,363 assigned to Chrysler Corporation. In such sliding door control assembly, if the outer handle is pulled, the door-open maintaining means and the door-close maintaining means are simultaneously released. If the passenger grasps the inner handle and presses a button mounted on the inner handle, the door-open maintaining means and the door-close maintaining means are simultaneously released.
In case of the outer handle, as the passenger, who stands outside, operates the outer handle, the operation of the handle is natural. However, in case of the inner handle, as the passenger must slide the door to open or shut in a small area of the inside of the car while grasping the inner handle with one hand and pressing the button, thereby it is very difficult and complicate in releasing the sliding door.
For another example, a method that the door-open maintaining means and the door-close maintaining means are released simultaneously when the inner handle is pulled in the same way as the outer handle has been also disclosed and used. However, the method is more complicate in releasing the sliding door than the sliding door control assembly disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,605,363.
It is, therefore, an object of the present invention to provide an inner handle assembly of a sliding door, which allows an inner handle to be operated conveniently to open and shut the sliding door.
To achieve the above object, the present invention provides an inner handle assembly of a sliding door comprising: a housing having a plurality of coupling parts and/or projections, the housing being assembled inside the sliding door through the medium of a coupling member such as a screw; an inner handle hinged to the housing to rotate in both directions; and an inner handle operation controlling means for controlling the operation of the inner handle to be always returned to a neutral position.